Low-Income Housing: Why Not in My Neighborhood?

Trulia looked at 3,083 low-income housing projects completed between 1996 and 2006 in the country’s 20 least-affordable markets to see whether such construction affected the values of neighboring homes. With a few exceptions, the presence of low-income housing seems to have had no impact.

To measure this, Trulia compared the median price per square foot of nearby homes (within 2,000 feet of low-income housing) with that of homes farther away (2,001 to 4,000 feet) over 20 years, starting 10 years before the low-income housing was built and ending 10 years after. (All the projects in the study were funded through the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit program administered by the Department of Housing and Urban Development.)

The study found the values of nearby homes and those farther away rose at about the same rate. Two exceptions: Boston and neighboring Cambridge, Mass., where nearby home values fell. In Denver, nearby home values rose.